Kynes

    Darcy Moonchild sat on a grassy hill, fully exposed to anyone who might know to look for her. Shrouded only in the blanketing twilight she gazed through her binoculars and watched the last car pull away from the hulking black building.

 

    “A-are you sure this is a good idea?” Starbuck asked. And Darcy looked over her shoulder to smile at him. Starbuck was everything that Darcy wasn’t: tall, slim and a complete push-over. 

 

    Darcy’s platinum blonde pixie-cut showed off her elf-like features, and a pair of round Lennon-style glasses sat too high on her plump, freckled cheeks. The glasses jumped even higher when she smiled exposing teeth that would be perfect were it not for the gap in the middle. She was on the shorter side and inclined to plumpness before she’d taken on a vegan diet. Now the only parts of her that implied she’d ever been softer were her wide hips barely covered by her daisy-dukes and her heavy tits that hung braless in her tank top.

 

    “Relax. Consider this a surprise inspection.” She tossed the binoculars to Starbuck as she stood, stretching her arms above her head and feeling the cold air on her underarms and bare legs, both unapologetically unshaven. If the Darcy from five years ago had seen her she’d be mortified, but this Darcy was healthy, sexy and doing work that she truly cared about. It was true what they said: Nothing tasted quite as good as skinny felt and Darcy felt incredible.

 

    “Come on.” She glanced over her shoulder to make sure that Starbuck was checking her out. “In and out. If nothing shady is going on they’ll never even know we were there.”

 

    “And just how likely is it that nothing shady is going on?”

 

    “Not likely.” 

 

    They made their way toward the factory, through the brambles and bushes. At one point Starbuck’s long hair caught on a branch and Darcy had to help him untangle it. When they finally reached the fence it was proper dark out and the only way someone could have known they were there was by the sound of their footfalls in the crunching leaves. 

 

    Darcy scrambled up the fence deftly, seeming to ignore the coil of barbed wire at the top as she vaulted over and landed gracefully on the other side. She glanced back at Starbuck. It was too dark to see his face, but she could imagine his open-mouthed stare just fine. 

 

    “They teach you that in veterinary school?” He asked and she allowed herself to laugh.

 

    “Toss me your pack and I’ll cut you an entrance.” 

 

    Starbuck threw the old canvas backpack over and for a moment, Dacy was worried it might snag on the barbed wire, but Starbuck had given it enough height. She bent her knees to dissipate some of its weight and reached in to retrieve the bolt cutters she’d packed for just this purpose.

 

    “I thought you said they’d never know we were here.” Starbuck chided as she began clipping at the fence. 

 

    “Well, you could always climb over the way I did.” 

 

    “Point taken. Please, clip away.” 

 

    When Darcy had made a wide enough hole she peeled back the fence, allowing Starbuck to slide through. Even without barbed wire to contend with, his obvious hesitation around the sharp ends of the clipped wires was stark in comparison to Darcy’s own devil-may-care attitude. Once he was through, she let go of the fence and it sprang closed, causing a loud metallic twang to echo through the night. 

 

    “Geez!” Starbuck let out a whispered hiss. “Do you want to get caught?”

 

    “Relax. There’s not one here to catch us.” She swaggered toward the factory, every movement full of confidence.

 

    “Right… Just us and the cows?”

 

    “Just us and the animals,” she corrected. “I’m willing to bet that there aren’t any cows here.” 

 

    Getting inside wasn’t much trouble. Darcy had come by during business hours and taped up a sign that said “Please leave this door unlocked” on one of the back entrances. She pulled it down and handed it to Starbuck with a wink.

 

    Inside the dark hallways of the factory the slap of Darcy’s tennis shoes on the laminate floor echoed so loudly that it tempered even her resolve. Surely someone would hear them. But, they were alone. She switched on a flashlight and listened for the sound of Starbuck’s heavy boots clomping along behind her. They reached a set of double doors with a sign that read:

 

“Danger -- Live animals”
“No unauthorized entry beyond this point.” 

 

    Darcy tried the handle. It wouldn’t budge.

 

    “Do you know how to pick a lock?” Starbuck asked. Darcy held out her hand and he gave her the bag. She reached inside until she found what she was looking for, pulled out a hammer and, with a single swing, knocked the handle off of one of the doors. She placed a palm against it and gently pushed it open.

 

    “Are you crazy!” Starbuck yelled, his own caution changing his scream into a whisper. “We can’t hide this?”

 

    Darcy ignored him tilting her chin upward. “Do you smell that?” She asked. It was an earthy smell, like stagnant water and algae. The smell wasn’t entirely unpleasant. In fact, it was much nicer than the ones Darcy tended to associate with captive animals.

 

    They stepped inside, and found themselves on a steel grate walkway with hand rails on either side and a massive pool of water churning less than a foot below. The room was dark, but Darcy could make out small islands of smooth rock, dotting the surface, though no animals stood on them. Suddenly, one of the islands moved, sliding toward them and bumping the platform, causing Darcy and Starbuck to scramble to grab the railing.

 

    “W-what was that?” Starbuck stammered. “Are they keeping whales in here?”

 

    “Not whales.” Darcy angled her light toward one of the creatures, revealing a round head with dark eyes and tiny ears. The eyes shut and the ears flapped as it turned to get out from the light. “Hippos.”

 

    “Hippos? But they’re so big!”

 

    It was true. Each of the animals was as big around as it was long. The effect made them look strangely orblike as they floated near the surface. 

 

    “If I had to guess, I’d say it has something to do with trying to pass them off as cows. Hippo meat isn’t exactly beef. Maybe this softens them up.” She pulled out her phone and snapped a few photos of the obese pachiderms. “That, or it makes them easier to store. I don’t think Hippos normally float like this.” 

 

    “This is messed up.” Starbuck kneeled down to get a better look at one of the Hipp-orbs. The animal grunted and kicked its feet but only succeeded in drifting vaguely in the hippy’s direction. “The press is going to have a field day with this.” 

 

    “How do you think they got them so round?” Darcy asked. 

 

    “I dunno. What do hippos eat?”

   Darcy gave him a withering glance, pushing up her glasses. “This isn’t natural, and it had to have been done on site. No way you could transport them like this.” She got up and continued down the walkway, Starbuck following close behind.
 

    “Shouldn’t we be leaving now?”

 

    “In a minute, once these photos go up online the company is going to try to cover all of this up. I want to make sure we get everything.” Darcy had been part of a few exposés over the years: A cosmetics corporation that was performing animal tests, a theme park that had been mistreating its animals. Every time, the company had managed to wriggle out of any real consequences. This time she was going to get damning irrefutable proof.

 

    At the end of the walkway was another set of double doors. These ones were unlocked and Darcy pushed her way in, cellphone ready. She’d expected stalls, maybe even cells where the hippos could be overfed and then rolled out into the pool. Instead she found herself face to face with an enormous machine.

 

    It looked like a two stories tall, mechanical totem pole, with each cross section sporting different kinds of apparatuses ranging from hoses to spikes to mechanical claw-arms. Starbuck’s mouth fell open and Darcy snapped a picture.

 

    “What is it?” Starbuck asked, but Darcy was already jogging over to a tram in the corner. It had metal restraints and ran along a track that led directly in front of the evil-looking machine.

   “I think that this is how they fattened up the hippos.” She snapped a few pictures of the restraints, imagining the helpless animals being locked into place and forced to undergo whatever  treatment the totem had in store for them. There was no way the company would be able to deny something like this.

 

    She was about to head back when something pushed her. She felt a blow against the small  of her back and fell forward onto the tram. The restraints clicked into place, tightening around her limbs.

 

    “Starbuck?” she yelped, thinking he had been the one that pushed her, but as the restraints pulled her upright she saw her companion, standing on the other side of the room, looking shocked and horrified. The arm that had pushed her hung a few feet away. It was long and mechanical, insect-like in its segmentation and it was attached to the totem-pole which was beginning to come to life.

 

    “Starbuck!” She yelled  again. “Get me out of this thing!” The tram rolled forward until she was directly in front of the machine and her restraints lifted her into the air. Her arms and legs were pulled out straight in a parody of Da Vinci's Vitruvian Man. 

 

    Starbuck ran up to the machine but was stopped by another pair of mechanical arms. He dodged them and backed away, looking back up at Darcy.

   “I’ll find a way to shut it off. Hold on!” He ran from the room, leaving Darcy alone with the machine’s flashing lights and whirring gears. A large metallic aperture descended in front of her and opened up like a door. The restraints slid her forward until she hung in the center of it and it began to close around her. She shrieked, thinking she would be vertically bisected, but as soon as the edges of the aperture met with the tips of her fingers and the ends of her shoes it stopped. The aperture rotated around her until it hung around her middle like an enormous metal hula-hoop and then the arms came.

 

    Each was tipped with a syringe and they jabbed at her, pricking her thighs, her stomach, her buttocks. She didn’t dare squirm, for fear that they might hurt her, but she didn’t like the idea of being pumped full of some kind of unknown chemical. The needles themselves didn’t hurt, but whatever was in them burned as it spread up her thighs and through her stomach and chest.

 

    She couldn’t help but wriggle as they pulled away and she twisted her hands in an attempt to fit them through the restraints. It was no good, she was stuck fast. A hose detached from the machine and rammed itself into her mouth. It was wide, nearly as big around as a baseball and obviously not designed for human mouths. It was also ribbed, and once it made its way past her teeth no amount of struggle could seem to dislodge it. Something thick and pungent started to slide down the tube. Darcy recognized the smell immediately: Pureed fish.

 

    Darcy had had her share of meat cravings since going vegan, but seafood had never been something she’d particularly missed. She shuddered as the cold raw meat filled her mouth and forced its way down her throat. She tried not to taste it as it filled her. When she was so full that she thought her stomach might burst it stopped and the syringes came out again.

 

    They pricked her, but this time the burning was accompanied by the feeling of her overstuffed stomach relaxing. She groaned in relief around the tube as her stomach emptied, only for her to realize where it had gone. She cried out as best she could as she looked herself over. She had the same body she’d had back in highschool. Pudgy and soft, her hips wide and her tummy bulging over the top of her daisy dukes. 

 

    She tried to remain calm as more of the fish sludge began to fill her belly. This couldn't be happening. She counted: 1… 2… 3… 4…

   After five seconds it stopped and another series of needles were ready to prick her softening flesh. Again her over stretched belly felt relief as all of the fish was burned into fat. She felt like she had back in college. The Freshman fifteen had hit her hard and it had carried into her sophomore and junior year. It had been the only time in her life that her belly had stuck out farther than her boobs, and now, despite years of dieting and exercise, she could see the pale dome of her belly peeking out from below her breasts. 

 

    The hose began pumping again. This time for six seconds. Each time she was pumped full to bursting and it allowed a bit more of the fishy paste into her body. Her shorts felt tight around her hips and cut into her thighs. Her shirt, which had been loose to begin with, now felt painted on, the lower roll of her burgeoning gut fluffing out of the bottom.Where was Starbuck? There had to be a way to turn this thing off before she got any bigger. 

 

    More injections. More fat. She was bigger than she’d ever been at this point. It would take months to work all of this off. The button on her shorts burst, pinging off the machine, and she let out an involuntary sigh of relief. She was sure that Starbuck was doing his best, but as the pounds piled on, she started to doubt he’d be able to help her at all. 

 

    The machine began pumping again. The panic has subsided and now and instead she tried to wrestle some control from the situation. 6...7...8…

 

    That was enough! She bit down on the tube, trying to stop the flow, but only caused it to back up and fill her at an even higher pressure than before. She groaned, feeling like she was about to burst, and actually welcomed the relief that the syringes brought when they finally came. 

 

    Her shorts finally ripped and burst off of her billowing ass, leaving her chubby lower half in only a pair of overstretched black panties with a pink bow on the front. She had to be at least double -- maybe tripple her weight. She could barely view herself over the bulging billowing flesh as she filled fatter and fatter.

 

    She felt her belly as it fully exposed itself to the cold air and her top rolled up under her Growing breasts. The weight of her body pulled her forward, but the restraints held her in place. The amount of stress being put on her wrists and ankles was starting to hurt.

 

    More fish, more fat, more growth. Her tank-top finally split down the middle as her breasts grew larger than her head. Fatter, bigger, longer as gravity acted on her already hefty titties, forcing them to rest on her ever fattening belly.

 

    How much longer could this go on? She barely cared at this point. Why had she even come to this factory? It seemed so important at the time. Darcy grew ever wider as the cycle of feeding and injections continued. 

 

    The rhythm was broken when a second round of injections interrupted her next feeding. At first Darcy thought that there was just more of her to inject than the machine could handle, but these one’s felt different. Instead of burning she felt cold, and more mechanical arms came and began to knead her fattened form. 

 

    Slowly they began to rub her, pushing and pulling her jiggling flab into places where, despite all logic. It seemed to stay. She’d been bottom heavy to begin with, but more and more of her new fat was being pushed into her gut until she was a definite apple. When the arms stopped, she had a butt and a set of lovehandles that looked disproportionately huge, even on her fattened body. Then the feeding started again, with a new rhythm.

 

    She would be stuffed, then all the fish in her belly would be converted into fat and finally the arms would shape her making her rounder and plumper to their specifications. She was unbelievably huge at this point, at least as big as the fattest person she’d ever seen. She could probably get her own TLC show. She was sure that audiences would go bananas for a super-sized vegan hippie to laugh at. 

 

    It was around this time that she felt her shoes burst off. She’d likely never see her toes again, but somehow the fact that even her feet were fat made the whole experience feel more real to her. She was totally naked now and growing wider by the second. Suddenly the aperture around her made sense. The machine wouldn’t stop until she was as fat as she was tall. 

 

    She groaned. What would her life be like? How could she ever lose so much weight. She’d tried so hard to stay skinny only for some evil corporation to screw it all up. That seemed weirdly appropriate to her and she felt another set of injections turn the goop in her belly into more fat. 

 

    She closed her eyes as she expanded outward only to feel something cold. Slowly, carefully she opened her eyes. To see that her belly had reached the edge of the ring. The aperture opened wider and her restraints were relaxed, dropping her to the floor. She landed on her plush tush and rolled onto her back. 

 

    She was jiggled softly, but despite so much weight pushing down on her maintained a general roundness. Whatever those second series of injections had done to her had more or less turned her into a ball, with the exception of her shortened limbs and her head protruding like a nipple from the top of her boob-like body. 

 

    More mechanical arms began to literally roll her toward the door, but, before she could reach it. A chute opened up beneath her and she plummeted, turning end over end and screaming as she slid down the chute found herself under water. She held her breath and paddled her arms, but with no effect on her trajectory. Finally she bobbed to the surface, bumping into one of the other hippos which grunted in annoyance.She spit out a stream of water and gasped, breathing deeply, finally free of the hose, the needles and the machine.

 

    “Oh my god! Darcy?” Starbuck ran up along the catwalk, looking flustered and sweaty. To his credit, it did seem like he'd practically exhausted himself looking for some way to help her. “What happened to you.” 

 

    She paddled her arms and kicked her feet so she could face him. Somewhere along the line she’d lost her glasses and he looked a bit blurry. 

 

    “Well… I guess we know what they’re doing to the hippos.” She smiled at him as best she could despite her situation.

 

    “Hold on a minute, I’ll get you out of there.” 

 

    “Don’t worry about it.” She said waving him off with one chubby hand. “I doubt I’d be able to climb the fence like this anyway.” 

 

    “Well… what do you want me to do?”

   “Do you have any cell reception here?” She asked. Having to kick again as he drifted out of her line of sight. The motion sent ripples through her fattend form and she stopped once she realized that Starbuck was staring at one of her watermelon sized tits. “Just get a picture of me and upload it with the others.”

 

    Despite her new form and the fact that she had no idea how she’d return to normal Darcy felt a smile spread across her face. “ They’re going to have a tough time explaining this one away.”